The present invention relates to a packaging machine, and more particularly to a blank feeder for a machine for shaping folded flat blanks into tubes of square to rectangular cross section, closing the tubes each at its one end, filling contents into the tubes and closing the filled tubes each at the other end thereof to form complete containers.
The packaging machine has a magazine for containing a stack of many folded flat blanks which are unfoldable into square or rectangular tubes.
Generally in the field of packaging, it is common practice to produce containers of different capacities by altering the height of containers having the same cross sectional area. For this purpose, blanks of different lengths are prepared.
When a packaging operation is to be started, blanks are usually loaded into the magazine manually by the operator, and after completion of the packaging operation, the remaining blanks are unloaded from the magazine similarly by the operator. Further when the kind of blanks is to be changed, the required portion of the magazine is manually so adjusted as to handle the blanks to be used, in addition to the manual unloading and loading procedures. In the field of packaging, mass production systems are presently being replaced by systems for producing small quantities of a wider variety of commodities. The latter systems require frequent change of blanks which is very cumbersome if the foregoing procedures are followed manually.